Lol I see what you mean, but I'd assume summoning stuff from Gringotts doesn't work, and that kind of stuff would almost never work. However, the sword of Gryfindor uses much older magic, I would assume, and it's almost as if Neville doesn't summon it, but the sword goes to whoever it knows needs it..like the sword has a mind of it's own and also uses such strong, old magic that most of the magical laws don't contain it. Needless to say, most things can't summon out of Gringotts but that sword was specially designed by Gryfindor and goblins, to come out of the sorting hat when it was needed, hundreds of years prior.
The sword comes out of the hat because it is automatically summoned when a Gryffindor needs it for something noble. So it probably just apparated in or whatever when it sensed Neville needing it.
mod parent up, it's what I've been saying throughout this whole article
Get over yourself people, Harry Potter has millions of fans young and old who find the story fun, and have enjoyed it for many years, and will enjoy it for many years to come. And in fact, in 60 or 70 years when Harry Potter becomes a middle school fiction staple (whether by requirement or by being on nearly every reading list next to Narnia and LOTR), you'll be putting down the next big thing by saying how it could never hold a candle to HP.
Actually, Felix a) seems to work on almost with a placebo effect, b) only tweaks the circumstances and c) seems to not provide luck as much as it just nudges the drinker in the right direction and gives them the self-assuredness to go in that direction (part of this may be the placebo effect).
If you remember, Ron thinks he drinks Felix and flies better in Quidditch, and Slughorn even says that it gives you the courage to do things well. Good things that happen could just be coincidences, but they could be attributed to Felix subconsciously. There is never any real proof Felix increases, per se, someone's luck (although Ron and Hermione at one point credit not getting struck by death eaters spells at the end of HBP to drinking it beforehand, but that could be a misattributed cause and effect reaction). In the end, it sounds like a lot of it is state-of-mind related. Also, it tweaks the circumstances, it doesn't change them which leads to C where its actually the user not the circumstances who is tweaked and the circumstances feel tweaked because the user just makes different choices which are generally right and lead to feelings of freedom and greatness due to the correctness and selfassuredness Felix induces.
I'm glad you read 1984 at 11 but the fact is plenty of kids would not be able to. They could read the words, maybe, but they just wouldn't understand it, and obviously there will be some exceptions. The fact is, it sounds great to question why kids aren't reading quality literature but a) maybe it's because they're kids and kids read kids book and b) because maybe HP isn't quite so trashy as people make it out to be. Maybe I am being overoptimistic about adult reading level, but fine, that's not really my problem. I just don't enjoy being grouped into the lowest common denominator of readers because I like Harry Potter just because you assume people who read it aren't capable of reading anything better. Because just for the record alongside Harry Potter, I've read all four books you've mentioned. 1984 I read when I was in 9th or 10th grade (13 or 14 years old) for the first time, Brave New World I read in 10th or 11th (15 or 16 years old), Catch 22 in 10th or 11th (15 or 16 years old), and Fahrenheit 451 in 8th or 9th grade I think (12 or 13 years old). I enjoyed them all, and they are by far not the only classics I've read. So just throwing that out there, since you seem to think it's so important.
Reality check: Shakespeare didn't have any literary merit when he wrote. He was writing a good story that the people could relate to, but with no more literary talent than one of today's dime novel authors. This fact is acknowledged by historians, for the record, I'm not just saying it. He was writing plays that could be fed to the masses at the time and the reason he has stayed so popular is because of his ability to tell a good story. Most of his plays aren't original, they're ripped off stories that were popular at the time. His writing, while in some cases very moving and beautiful, wasn't exceptionally amazing and was written in the tongue of the time. Don't let the olde English trick you into thinking that he was writing fancily, his works were written in English that England's peasants could relate to. He even made up words like Rowling. Maybe in 400 years "muggle" will be on some list of great words that the literary genius Rowling thought up.
You're right, popularity does not equal quality. Notice how I never said that. I just said that popularity does not equal trash either. Harry Potter happens to not only be popular but actually good. And that is an opinion, but it's an opinion held by many people about a book that was the result of a lot of work. The pet rock is a fad, Harry Potter is more than a fad because fads do not last 10 years and have millions of loyal fans throughout who will stay fans even once the series ends and probably have children who they'll share the story with. Stop polarizing everything, there is something called "gray" and it's in between black and white.
Yeah and then they found out that they enjoyed them and they continued. Trust me, people aren't reading Harry Potter because it's a popularity contest. They probably heard about it and wanted to see what all the fuss was about and realized they liked it. If it wasn't popular they may have liked it but never heard of it, but they heard about it because it was popular, BECAUSE a lot of people liked it.
Oh shut up, lawyers trying to stop morons from spoiling the book on YTMND are a completely different story, and rationalize all you want, but releasing the spoilers to people is a dickish move. The fad was only slightly funny for HP6 but this time around it was predictable and trollish, but not actually humorous or original which was what made the Snape Kills Dumbledore fad acceptable, despite the dickishness of that as well.
Harry's death reminded me of Aslan and Narnia almost (both of course were based on Jesus, but I'm thinking in terms of fantasy novels since that's what Harry Potter is).
If Snape could enter Grimmauld Place, then why didn't he told the Death Eaters where it was? Voldemort should be aware that wherever the Headquarter of the Order was, Snape knew it, and with Dumbledore's death Snape would become a secret keeper. Are you sure he was a secret-keeper? I thought that somewhere in the book they said he wasn't, but I'm not sure. After all, Dumbledore would have known to NOT make Snape a secret keeper because it would be easier on Snape who wouldn't have to lie to Voldemort (something requiring him to use Occlumency) but instead tell the truth and have Voldemort not find out without suspicion towards Snape.
Or you could argue that it is newsworthy because millions of people enjoy it (plenty of Slashdotters included), and no, we actually aren't the lowest common denominator when it comes to reading literature. But good job, you really sounded opinionated and roguishly original with your "harry potter sucks why is it popular" comment. I'm glad someone brought it up.
I agree with you although personally while Rowling's style may not be her strength or what's noticeable, I don't think it's bad. It just isn't as unique as some authors'.
Also maybe I'm mistaken but didn't Slytherin get ordered to leave?
I just read your post, especially the part about LOTR and Narnia, and thats exactly what I've been replying to everyone with throughout this article. Good to know I'm not the only one who thinks HP is contemporary Narnia and LOTR. Also I agree about the people who get bent out of shape because it's popular, it's a "kids" book, and it's hyped up. They are dumb reasons not read it. LOTR was written for children. Narnia was written for children. Books like Alice in Wonderland which some adults enjoy trying to study were all written for children. But that doesn't make them worthless and trashy for adults, and the beauty is that they can be enjoyed on many different levels for every age group.
I agree with the OP and I think that in 60-70 years people will look at Harry Potter the way LOTR and Narnia and books of that type are looked at now. Of course, like the OP, I know I'm making myself a hate magnet for everyone who likes LOTR more than HP and feels that I'm insulting their book series and author (which I'm by no means doing).
Okay, if you're talking about children, then you should get out more because children aren't supposed to read those books until High School, and if they want to, then more power to them but frankly a lot of it will go over their heads. This is generally accepted by the educational system, so it's not just me ranting. Seriously, they will read those books some day but if you're thinking of 1st-7th grade then just chill out. You don't have to make the do anything, they will be reading them once they get older. Your comment is about as stupid as wondering why a kindergartener isn't jumping from his 10 page book on shapes to Finnegan's Wake. He can read after all, right?
Now if you're talking about adults, you also should get over it because I'm pretty sure many of the adults have read those classics anyway. Of course with people like you anything that isn't at least 50 years old is trash. Which is ironic, because when a lot of "classics" came out, they were popular and considered trashy and it's only with age that jerks like you get to pull them out of your pocket as if talking about the depth of High School English class novels is the most original thing in the world.
I love the Harry Potter books, and I'm not a sappy preteen saying this (although at one point way back I was:P)
Anyway the movies suck. I see them through a mixture of being bored and being a fanboy of types. But read the books, or at least try them. Forget the movies. They do not hold together AT ALL; they rely on the fact that they can assume their target audience already knows the story. If you don't know the story, then it seems like random scenes of bad actors pretending to do magic.
Ignoring the Aspergers comment which was kind of unnecessary, it's kind of stupid to tell adults to read grown-up books. Go ahead and read classics if you want, I'm sure many of the adults reading Harry Potter have read those as well. But please don't try and tell people that anything popular and contemporary is trash. You sound like a pretentious know-it-all that way. Newsflash: Plenty of the classics you are thinking of are only classics because they aged well; when they came out, many considered them to be trashy as well.
In short: contemporary and popular != trash
Seriously, HP could very well be taught in middle schools in 60-70 years. Look at Narnia and LOTR, for example. And I bet all you pretentious numskulls will be worshiping it as quality fantasy.
I sense sarcasm, but either way it is idiotic to not enjoy something because it's popular. As someone pointed out, are you 15? And I'm not just saying that to be a dick; when I was 14/15/16 I acted the same way towards music and people which was, in retrospect, quite stupid. Things, especially books, become popular when they are good. I guess if you were in Shakespeare's time, you would refuse to see his plays because they were trashy, soap opera-like, and popular. Maybe give Harry Potter 300-400 years and we'll see if it's become classic enough for your taste. Your only denying yourself enjoyment though, because Harry Potter might have turned out to be one of your favorite book series if you didn't put pretentiousness first.
It's like those stupid "Girls Gone Wild" DVDs: you have to make sure and get the girls to sign waivers (or "model release" papers). Alcohol helps, I hear, which is among the reasons why that vile fuckwit Joe Francis is probably headed to jail in the near future. Oh shut the fuck up. This is the worst possible way you could defend your already crappy and fallacy-shredded argument. The girls you refer to are college-age women who go to hot vacation spots on Spring Break with the intention to get wasted and flash people. Joe Francis and his crew just photograph it. The girls like it because they are attention whores which is why they do it in the first place. So just shut up and stop trying to "defend" people who don't even want your defense.
oh be quiet, tons of people love photo tagging because they like seeing photos from various events for the memories and phototagging makes everything easier for everyone. just because your paranoid it doesnt mean that its everyone else's problem. the fact is, if we're talking about Facebook here, its extremely easy for photo tagging to benefit friends but not the FBI, your future employer and/or stalkers, etc. There are tons of privacy settings and if you took the time to work with them instead of bitching that the Facebook account you created is giving away your personal information then maybe you wouldnt have this problem
Re:You mean DUCKS look sorta like PENGUINS?!
on
Microsoft Using .MS TLD
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
why is this a troll? I agree, the idea that the duck is a stolen idea from the penguin is stupid. not everything has to become an argument over copyrights and logo stealing just because its microsoft.
State and Local Governments inherit the powers not specifically designated to anyone. However, Federal law supercedes state law and state law cannot violate federal law, nor can it be unconstitutional. A state law, therefore, which violates the first amendment is NOT alloweded as it is unconstitutional.
Slashdot Mirror
Lol I see what you mean, but I'd assume summoning stuff from Gringotts doesn't work, and that kind of stuff would almost never work. However, the sword of Gryfindor uses much older magic, I would assume, and it's almost as if Neville doesn't summon it, but the sword goes to whoever it knows needs it..like the sword has a mind of it's own and also uses such strong, old magic that most of the magical laws don't contain it. Needless to say, most things can't summon out of Gringotts but that sword was specially designed by Gryfindor and goblins, to come out of the sorting hat when it was needed, hundreds of years prior.
The sword comes out of the hat because it is automatically summoned when a Gryffindor needs it for something noble. So it probably just apparated in or whatever when it sensed Neville needing it.
mod parent up, it's what I've been saying throughout this whole article Get over yourself people, Harry Potter has millions of fans young and old who find the story fun, and have enjoyed it for many years, and will enjoy it for many years to come. And in fact, in 60 or 70 years when Harry Potter becomes a middle school fiction staple (whether by requirement or by being on nearly every reading list next to Narnia and LOTR), you'll be putting down the next big thing by saying how it could never hold a candle to HP.
Actually, Felix a) seems to work on almost with a placebo effect, b) only tweaks the circumstances and c) seems to not provide luck as much as it just nudges the drinker in the right direction and gives them the self-assuredness to go in that direction (part of this may be the placebo effect). If you remember, Ron thinks he drinks Felix and flies better in Quidditch, and Slughorn even says that it gives you the courage to do things well. Good things that happen could just be coincidences, but they could be attributed to Felix subconsciously. There is never any real proof Felix increases, per se, someone's luck (although Ron and Hermione at one point credit not getting struck by death eaters spells at the end of HBP to drinking it beforehand, but that could be a misattributed cause and effect reaction). In the end, it sounds like a lot of it is state-of-mind related. Also, it tweaks the circumstances, it doesn't change them which leads to C where its actually the user not the circumstances who is tweaked and the circumstances feel tweaked because the user just makes different choices which are generally right and lead to feelings of freedom and greatness due to the correctness and selfassuredness Felix induces.
I'm glad you read 1984 at 11 but the fact is plenty of kids would not be able to. They could read the words, maybe, but they just wouldn't understand it, and obviously there will be some exceptions. The fact is, it sounds great to question why kids aren't reading quality literature but a) maybe it's because they're kids and kids read kids book and b) because maybe HP isn't quite so trashy as people make it out to be. Maybe I am being overoptimistic about adult reading level, but fine, that's not really my problem. I just don't enjoy being grouped into the lowest common denominator of readers because I like Harry Potter just because you assume people who read it aren't capable of reading anything better. Because just for the record alongside Harry Potter, I've read all four books you've mentioned. 1984 I read when I was in 9th or 10th grade (13 or 14 years old) for the first time, Brave New World I read in 10th or 11th (15 or 16 years old), Catch 22 in 10th or 11th (15 or 16 years old), and Fahrenheit 451 in 8th or 9th grade I think (12 or 13 years old). I enjoyed them all, and they are by far not the only classics I've read. So just throwing that out there, since you seem to think it's so important.
Reality check: Shakespeare didn't have any literary merit when he wrote. He was writing a good story that the people could relate to, but with no more literary talent than one of today's dime novel authors. This fact is acknowledged by historians, for the record, I'm not just saying it. He was writing plays that could be fed to the masses at the time and the reason he has stayed so popular is because of his ability to tell a good story. Most of his plays aren't original, they're ripped off stories that were popular at the time. His writing, while in some cases very moving and beautiful, wasn't exceptionally amazing and was written in the tongue of the time. Don't let the olde English trick you into thinking that he was writing fancily, his works were written in English that England's peasants could relate to. He even made up words like Rowling. Maybe in 400 years "muggle" will be on some list of great words that the literary genius Rowling thought up.
You're right, popularity does not equal quality. Notice how I never said that. I just said that popularity does not equal trash either. Harry Potter happens to not only be popular but actually good. And that is an opinion, but it's an opinion held by many people about a book that was the result of a lot of work. The pet rock is a fad, Harry Potter is more than a fad because fads do not last 10 years and have millions of loyal fans throughout who will stay fans even once the series ends and probably have children who they'll share the story with. Stop polarizing everything, there is something called "gray" and it's in between black and white.
Yeah and then they found out that they enjoyed them and they continued. Trust me, people aren't reading Harry Potter because it's a popularity contest. They probably heard about it and wanted to see what all the fuss was about and realized they liked it. If it wasn't popular they may have liked it but never heard of it, but they heard about it because it was popular, BECAUSE a lot of people liked it.
Oh shut up, lawyers trying to stop morons from spoiling the book on YTMND are a completely different story, and rationalize all you want, but releasing the spoilers to people is a dickish move. The fad was only slightly funny for HP6 but this time around it was predictable and trollish, but not actually humorous or original which was what made the Snape Kills Dumbledore fad acceptable, despite the dickishness of that as well.
Harry's death reminded me of Aslan and Narnia almost (both of course were based on Jesus, but I'm thinking in terms of fantasy novels since that's what Harry Potter is).
Or you could argue that it is newsworthy because millions of people enjoy it (plenty of Slashdotters included), and no, we actually aren't the lowest common denominator when it comes to reading literature. But good job, you really sounded opinionated and roguishly original with your "harry potter sucks why is it popular" comment. I'm glad someone brought it up.
I agree with you although personally while Rowling's style may not be her strength or what's noticeable, I don't think it's bad. It just isn't as unique as some authors'. Also maybe I'm mistaken but didn't Slytherin get ordered to leave?
I just read your post, especially the part about LOTR and Narnia, and thats exactly what I've been replying to everyone with throughout this article. Good to know I'm not the only one who thinks HP is contemporary Narnia and LOTR. Also I agree about the people who get bent out of shape because it's popular, it's a "kids" book, and it's hyped up. They are dumb reasons not read it. LOTR was written for children. Narnia was written for children. Books like Alice in Wonderland which some adults enjoy trying to study were all written for children. But that doesn't make them worthless and trashy for adults, and the beauty is that they can be enjoyed on many different levels for every age group.
I agree with the OP and I think that in 60-70 years people will look at Harry Potter the way LOTR and Narnia and books of that type are looked at now. Of course, like the OP, I know I'm making myself a hate magnet for everyone who likes LOTR more than HP and feels that I'm insulting their book series and author (which I'm by no means doing).
Okay, if you're talking about children, then you should get out more because children aren't supposed to read those books until High School, and if they want to, then more power to them but frankly a lot of it will go over their heads. This is generally accepted by the educational system, so it's not just me ranting. Seriously, they will read those books some day but if you're thinking of 1st-7th grade then just chill out. You don't have to make the do anything, they will be reading them once they get older. Your comment is about as stupid as wondering why a kindergartener isn't jumping from his 10 page book on shapes to Finnegan's Wake. He can read after all, right?
Now if you're talking about adults, you also should get over it because I'm pretty sure many of the adults have read those classics anyway. Of course with people like you anything that isn't at least 50 years old is trash. Which is ironic, because when a lot of "classics" came out, they were popular and considered trashy and it's only with age that jerks like you get to pull them out of your pocket as if talking about the depth of High School English class novels is the most original thing in the world.
I love the Harry Potter books, and I'm not a sappy preteen saying this (although at one point way back I was :P)
Anyway the movies suck. I see them through a mixture of being bored and being a fanboy of types. But read the books, or at least try them. Forget the movies. They do not hold together AT ALL; they rely on the fact that they can assume their target audience already knows the story. If you don't know the story, then it seems like random scenes of bad actors pretending to do magic.
Ignoring the Aspergers comment which was kind of unnecessary, it's kind of stupid to tell adults to read grown-up books. Go ahead and read classics if you want, I'm sure many of the adults reading Harry Potter have read those as well. But please don't try and tell people that anything popular and contemporary is trash. You sound like a pretentious know-it-all that way. Newsflash: Plenty of the classics you are thinking of are only classics because they aged well; when they came out, many considered them to be trashy as well. In short: contemporary and popular != trash Seriously, HP could very well be taught in middle schools in 60-70 years. Look at Narnia and LOTR, for example. And I bet all you pretentious numskulls will be worshiping it as quality fantasy.
I sense sarcasm, but either way it is idiotic to not enjoy something because it's popular. As someone pointed out, are you 15? And I'm not just saying that to be a dick; when I was 14/15/16 I acted the same way towards music and people which was, in retrospect, quite stupid. Things, especially books, become popular when they are good. I guess if you were in Shakespeare's time, you would refuse to see his plays because they were trashy, soap opera-like, and popular. Maybe give Harry Potter 300-400 years and we'll see if it's become classic enough for your taste. Your only denying yourself enjoyment though, because Harry Potter might have turned out to be one of your favorite book series if you didn't put pretentiousness first.
oh be quiet, tons of people love photo tagging because they like seeing photos from various events for the memories and phototagging makes everything easier for everyone. just because your paranoid it doesnt mean that its everyone else's problem. the fact is, if we're talking about Facebook here, its extremely easy for photo tagging to benefit friends but not the FBI, your future employer and/or stalkers, etc. There are tons of privacy settings and if you took the time to work with them instead of bitching that the Facebook account you created is giving away your personal information then maybe you wouldnt have this problem
why is this a troll? I agree, the idea that the duck is a stolen idea from the penguin is stupid. not everything has to become an argument over copyrights and logo stealing just because its microsoft.
good point.. funny how this happened over 100 years after 1868 not really changing my argument
State and Local Governments inherit the powers not specifically designated to anyone. However, Federal law supercedes state law and state law cannot violate federal law, nor can it be unconstitutional. A state law, therefore, which violates the first amendment is NOT alloweded as it is unconstitutional.
thanks, I appreciate that :)